Living Wills

A Living Will is now more commonly known as an Advanced Directive.

What is it?

What this is, is a statement of your views, preferences and wishes regarding future medical treatment should you be unable to communicate or decide these yourself – in short, it helps you guide decisions about your future medical treatment. An example of what might appear in an Advanced Directive is your preferences around life sustaining treatment i.e being fed artificially through a tube or drip or being placed on a ventilator if you cannot breathe on your own. Some people are happy for the above to happen, others are not. Noting it in an Advanced Directive is your opportunity to state your wishes formally when you have had time to give them careful consideration.

Why make one?

Although not legally binding in Scotland, an Advanced Directive can be very persuasive in guiding decisions around medical treatment required.

It can also help ease any anguish, guilt and distress placed on loved ones at a very upsetting time.

Loved ones may well have an idea of what your preferences would be, but seeing it in black and white almost omits the feeling that the decision of what you would want to happen is down to them.

If you do not have an Advanced Directive or a Welfare Power of Attorney in place, then any decision about your treatment is down to your doctor.

Your doctor would of course take into consideration what your loved ones views were, but ultimately they do not legally have to follow any guidance received.

This means that the doctor would have the final say about your long or short-term treatment.

Advanced legal advice

Our legal experts can go into detail about the sort of information you can include and will draft your Advanced Directive on your behalf – the process is fairly straight-forward and extremely worthwhile.

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Kirkcaldy: 01592 204774

Dunfermline: 01383 738000

Burntisland: 01592 873501

Dundee: 01382 568188

Broxburn: 01506 855777

Get in touch

Get in touch to book your appointment with one of our expert solicitors today. It goes hand in hand with making a Will or can easily be made as a stand-alone document if you already have an up-to-date Will in place.